Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 Interview

Interview with Steven Masters,Game Designerby Adam Brown

February 8th - Ubisoft invited CheatCC and other media sources to attend a Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 preview event in San Francisco. We had the opportunity to get our hands on the game and we can say it was a solid experience. Check back this coming week for the detailed hands-on preview! We also got the chance to interview one of the game designers, Steven Masters. Read on to see what he had to say about the exciting upcoming shooter.

CCC:
With all of the great new additions and features in the original Rainbow Six Vegas, what new things can we expect to find in Vegas 2?

SM:
Well, we sort of approached that on a few different levels. At the basic gameplay level, you have the sprinting, the penetrable cover, and a lot more breakable cover now. Around the cover and shoot mechanics, we've got some really nice additions that make it feel a lot more solid. You have to think a lot more about what you're seeing and what you're doing, where you're fighting, what the enemy can see or view, and also exploit that on the other side. If you see a terrorist hiding behind a wooden box [and] you can shoot through it, it is just more fun. So at that level, the core level stuff, it feels a lot more solid now; the world is a lot more realistic. Then you have the story line stuff where we focused a lot on making sure all of the characters have good motivations. We wanted to complete the story. There were unanswered questions at the end of Vegas; at the end of Vegas 2, they're answered. It really ties everything together quite nicely. So then you have the multiplayer enhancements, specifically the new P.E.C. stuff, and [we're] bringing your P.E.C. character into single player so you can play as yourself in single player. So those give us a great level of improvement there as well. So together we've done a nice little package of bringing Vegas to that next extra step forward.

CCC:
With the original Vegas being such a success, did you find it difficult to make any improvements?

SM:
Yeah, we had to listen a lot to our customers really. That shows in like the choice of the weapons we brought in. We also addressed a lot of complaints with the multiplayer stuff. Vegas was unusual for me; at the end of development I wanted to play it still. I wanted to go online and have fun playing multiplayer. It is so rewarding hearing everyone just having a laugh and really enjoying what they are doing. But then when you run into the frustrations [when] people [are] joining a room then having to sit there and wait and wait and wait, and some of the weapons not really being very well balanced. Having the chance to go back and fix those things was not just gratifying as a developer but as a player as well. Like I said, we listened a lot to what people had to say and we tried to fix the things that they wanted.

CCC:
Will you still be able to use the Xbox Live Vision Camera to import your picture into the Xbox 360 version of Vegas 2, and will you be able to use the PlayStation Eye for the PS3 version?

SM:
Absolutely, for the Xbox 360, the Playstation 3, and the PC. You can use a webcam for the PC.

CCC:
Will there be any major or minor differences between any of the three versions of Vegas 2?

SM:
No, the Xbox 360 and PS3 are basically identical. I'm sure if you take screenshots of walls or whatever you're going to find a minor subtle difference in the lighting or texture resolution in one or the other but they are the same art assets and underlying code base. It is just the engine that deals with the architecture that's different. We've got the same framerate, and we haven't had to make any sacrifices on visual quality anywhere. With the PC, obviously it is slightly different because you can scale it back to be lower resolution and things like that. Really the majority of difference that you see quality wise is down to televisions now. The Xbox 360 and PS3 versions are basically identical.